it’s been a long time since i owned a PDA. the last (and first) PDA that i owned was a Palm V. i think that i may have even got it back in the 90s. is that possible? maybe it was early 2000. anyway, i used it a lot when i got it, then i stopped using it because i didn’t really need it that much. it got a new life when i lent it to away so that it can be used, but then it was broken. i didn’t grieve much about the loss because i didn’t really use it very much so it was no big deal.

the biggest reason why i never got another one was because a PDA that simply is an organizer just isn’t very useful for me. pocket pcs started to look attractive when you could get ethernet add-ons so that you can plug into the internet, but still it wasn’t quite compelling enough. it started to get even more attractive when you could have wireless internet access with the device. i almost bought a new PDA when there was bluetooth support and bluetooth GPS devices. this is when things started to get interesting. the only reason i didn’t buy the PDA and GPS device was because it was still prohibitively expensive and the GPS wasn’t great.

i bought christi a GPS unit (the TomTom GO 910) because she liked having somebody (even if it was a GPS) talk to her during her drive. she fell immediately in love with the device. never again did she have to use google maps. never again did she have to call to get directions. nope. tomtom was there for her. when i started to drive around with tomtom, it was great. the convenience of having a GPS unit is amazing and for the most part it has always led us to the right location. some of the new developments weren’t listed, but i guess that is to be expected and easily fixed with map upgrades.

i was tempted enough to purchase myself a GPS unit. I had struggled with what brand and model to get. garmin seems to be the industry leader and tomtom is a relative newcomer to the US market. i eventually decided to go with the TomTom because of the storage space and mp3 playing capabilities. listening to music or audiobooks in one device was a big plus for christi. the GPS unit seemed attractive enough that i really did almost buy one for myself.

and then i remembered the last time i almost bought a GPS unit. it was a dell axim and bluetooth set up. pretty neat, but expensive and not integrated. today i saw a new device by HP, the HP IPAQ rx5915. it’s a PDA+GPS unit combined with wireless internet. finally a device that has GPS, wireless internet, and bluetooth integrated together. it was a matter of time.

i know that we are still a few years away from having a good GPS/inet/phone/camera integrated device, but there are already phones that have GPS on them. the big challenge is always deciding if this device is a phone or a GPS. we like small phones, but we like big screens on our GPS. those two seem to be fundamentally different form factors so trying to integrate it doesn’t seem like a perfect solution can exist.

but for now, i’m eagerly anticipating my order to come so that i can play with my new PDA….and GPS. anybody know of any good pocket pc resources?